CNN Refuses To Retract Report, Even After ‘Anonymous’ Sources Claim They Were Misquoted

CNN is still refusing to retract its claim that President Trump was aware of a 2016 meeting between his team and a Russian lawyer, even though one of its main sources is walking back his claims.

It all started with the story of a 2016 meeting between Trump’s team and a lawyer from Russia, where the reported intent was to exchange dirt on rival Hillary Clinton.

CNN published a story citing anonymous sources to claim that Trump knew about the meeting in advance. The sources cited Trump’s former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who recently pled guilty to tax fraud and campaign finance violations

Major mainstream media outlets reported that Cohen’s attorney, Lanny Davis, was the source behind the story, and they have also noted that he is walking back his claims, and now saying that Cohen had no knowledge of the meeting.

“I think the reporting of the story got mixed up in the course of a criminal investigation. We were not the source of the story,” Davis told Anderson Cooper.

Davis then told Buzzfeed that while he was a source for the story, he “made a mistake” and “did not mean to be cute.”

“I should have been more clear—including with you—that I could not independently confirm what happened,” Davis also told the Washington Post.

In response to the claims, President Trump took to Twitter to insist that he knew nothing about the meeting, and to blame the ordeal on the “fake news media.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee has also released a statement claiming Cohen testified under oath that he was not aware of the meeting prior to its public disclosure.

While the mainstream media continue to focus on the now infamous meeting at Trump Tower, it does so without proof that there was involvement from the Russia government.

Yet even with Davis publicly stating that the claims made in the story were false, CNN has refused to issue a retraction and is instead relying on vague anonymous sources to secure the public’s trust.